Our Fake Interview with Dennis Quaid

Make no mistake — we could have interviewed Dennis Quaid if we wanted to. He’s practically on our speed-dial. But then we got to thinking about it, and we figured he’s probably doing a lot of interviews for “G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra,” in which he plays someone or something called “General Hawk,” and he’d probably give us the same answers he gave everyone else. So instead of wasting his time with an interview, we just made one up. We’re pretty sure the following fictional exchange is more or less the way it would have gone down if we’d actually talked to him.

QUAID: Well, it had been a while since I’d starred in a loud, stupid summer blockbuster. “The Day After Tomorrow” was the last one, and that was 2004. I just felt like it was time to phone one in and collect a paycheck.

FILM: Fair enough. So how come it’s called “G.I. Joe” when there’s not actually anyone named Joe in it?

QUAID: Interesting story. There was a character named Joe, but he got cut out in the editing room. He’ll be on the DVD.

FILM: Your brother, Randy Quaid, is 3 1/2 years older than you. At what point when you guys were growing up did people start calling you the Handsome One and Randy the Goofy-Looking One?

QUAID: When I was about six.

FILM: You’ve played several real people over the course of your career, including Jerry Lee Lewis, Sam Houston, and Doc Holliday. Were you ever visited by the ghosts of any of these people, and if so, did they approve of your performance?

QUAID: A very angry Sam Houston showed up at the foot of my bed one night, firing ghost pistols in the air over the way “The Alamo” turned out. I couldn’t tell if he was mad about the movie “The Alamo,” or the actual Alamo.

FILM: Either way, the outcome wasn’t pretty.

QUAID: True dat!

FILM: Have you ever noticed that you have the same initials as Dairy Queen?

QUAID: Yes, actually. I once tried to sue the company for copyright infringement, since they call themselves “DQ,” and “DQ” is also what I call myself sometimes. But the case was thrown out of court, unfortunately.

FILM: Tell me about your greatest film, which of course is “Jaws 3-D.”

QUAID: Gladly! That was a terrific experience. Of course you recall it was directed by the great Joe Alves, a production designer who had never directed a movie before and hasn’t made one since. A lot of people don’t realize that when you make a 3-D movie, everything you’re shooting — the props, the sets, everything — is actually in three dimensions. For example, the mechanical shark. That thing was really there, occupying three dimensions of space! If you were on the set, you’d think, “Wow, that shark is really in 3-D!” It’s quite something.

FILM: Did you know that the porn version of “Enemy Mine” was called “Enema Mine”?

QUAID: Of course I did. I starred in that, too.

FILM: Oh snap! Hey, remember how you were married to Meg Ryan, but then you got divorced, and then she kept dissing you in public?

QUAID: Oh, man, yeah.

FILM: Don’t you think her plastic surgery has made her look like a mannequin that got caught in a fire?

QUAID: Yes, exactly.

FILM: Well, that’s all the time we have. Thanks so much for the interview!

QUAID: No, thank you! You were a great interviewer.

FILM: Oh, you’re just saying that.

QUAID: No, I mean it! In fact, I have to say you’re probably the handsomest movie critic I’ve ever met.